Sorry I haven’t been blogging lately. Just too much to do and not enough energy to do it all. But I need to finish off this series and get back to some writing blogs, along with a report on this year’s Liberty Con. So, here goes.

Balancing rock off of Hwy 313.

The trip was nearing its end. It was Thursday of the second week. Friday I would be driving back to Vegas, then flying home of Saturday. But I still had a lot to see over those last two travel days. Today it was two national parks. I had visited both Arches and Canyonlands in July of 2017. Arches had been partially closed down by road work, and Canyonlands was worth another look, and, more importantly, a filming. It was overcast. So much for coming out to where it doesn’t rain. But I got what the day had to offer, and there was no use complaining about it. So, after breakfast at Denny’s I was off on the first part of the adventure, Looking for some sodas to drink on the drive. I stopped at the Chevron station just north of the Hwy 313, the road going out to Canyonlands.

River flowing through Canyonlands.

There was almost no parking at the Chevron station, which also served as the point of entry to a private land four wheeler area. I finally got one, and bought a brace of diet cokes. I told the clerk a little about my adventures in the Mojave, and she said that the enclosed rides they used were much easier to handle. So maybe someday. Armed with caffeine, I headed back to 313. There is a dinosaur exhibit at the corner of the roads, Moab Giants. It looked interesting, but I only had so much daylight, and I put it down for another time.

View into the canyon at Canyonlands.

313 is a beautiful drive, with lots of cliffs, mesas, balancing rocks, switchbacks, everything you look for out west. Some of the switchbacks were twenty mile an hour roads with steep drop offs. At one point I had someone crowding behind me who wanted to go faster in the steep curve. I wasn’t having any of it, and drove at what I thought was a safe speed. After the switchbacks the terrain flattens out some, though there are still some cool mesas off to the north. I passed the entrance to Dead Horse Point State Park. Cool place, I’ve been there before, and you can read about it on one of my earlier blogs. Today I didn’t have time.

Rains in the Canyon.

I told the ranger at the station that I had called ahead and requested no rain. His flat faced response was that we got what nature gave us. I stopped at the visitor center to look for a book. I found one on Utah Geology and added it to my collection. Outside it had started to drop sparse flakes of snow. As said before in an earlier blog, I’m not afraid of snow. In fact, I really like it, in moderation. What I don’t like is driving in it. I recall sliding out of control on a Tuscaloosa street after a winter storm. Fortunately, I didn’t hit anything. But that feeling of no control was something I really couldn’t stand. Heavy clouds were gathering to the northwest, and I decided I better start moving.

Rock formations in Park Avenue, Arches.

One old guy was testing out his mountain bike, a couple of feet from a cliff. Insane, as it looked like he was barely in control, and that was a long drop off. Unfortunately, he was old enough he had probably already reproduced. I went down the road, stopping at the overlooks, filming and taking pictures. I went down a few of the roads I had missed my first time through, like the one to the Green River Overlook. At one I saw a lady carrying at cat to the viewing point. I yelled out, ‘is that a cat?’ ‘Yes,” she yelled back. ‘He likes the view.’ I guess it takes all kinds, and I hope the poor kitty didn’t jump out of her arms to go over a cliff.

One of the Windows, Arches NP.

At the Green River Overlook I met up with a group of people with Notre Dame regalia. I asked if they went there and received an affirmative. I said ‘maybe someday you’ll beat us.” When they asked who ‘us’ was, I said ‘FSU’, and received a chorus of groans. Man, I have so much fun on these trips.

And arch in the making. Arches NP.

The Grand Canyon is spectacular in a different way here than in the Grand Canyon National Park. The rocks aren’t as colorful, but the canyon is much wider, and two rivers come together to make one. Well worth the trip, but if you had to choose I would say go to the park in Arizona. At the final overlook I saw the worrisome sight of heavy clouds moving my way across the canyon, while the wind gusted. Dark rain was falling, looking for all the world like a cloud burst. I filmed it for a little time until I thought it was time to get to the car. I had no desire to be soaked to the bone in forty some degree temperatures. I sat in the car, which was rocking a bit from the wind gusts, waiting. And the rains never came. I got out to look and saw that it was now heading up the canyon.

A pair of windows. Arches NP.

The day was not the best for video taping or photography, but as the ranger said, we get what nature gives us. Now snowflakes were falling again, and I decided it was time to head out and check out Arches. As I was driving through the park entrance the snow really started coming down. It was sticking and building up on the ground beside the road, but was not sticking on the asphalt yet. The temperature kept dropping, until it was just above freezing, and I was starting to worry that I might have gotten caught in a snowstorm. I made it through the switchbacks, and soon the snow was far behind me. It was time for something to eat, for both myself and the car. I had to drive into Moab, and stopped at the 7-11. I was on my way to Arches.

The Balancing Rock. Arches NP.

It was about three in the afternoon when I pulled up to the entrance of Arches. I asked the ranger if it was snowing up on the plateau, and she replied that no, but it had been snowing at Canyonlands. I told he I had been up there. She looked at my Florida license, said she could understand why that concerned me, and said ‘welcome to Utah.’ Another switchback up to the plateau that held the park, beautiful rock formations, then the first stop, at Park Avenue. The snowcapped mountains in the distance were beautiful. All of the road work was done. I got a good look at the formations of Park Avenue from both the front and the back, then moved on down the road, stopping at most of the pullovers to get shots of the next formations.

Clifs, Arches NP.

I had to stop at Balancing Rock, even though I had gone over it fairly well on my last trip. A balancing rock is a formation where erosion has eaten away most of the top layer, leaving a single boulder that is still on top of the column of the lower layer. They are not permanent. I’m not sure how long they last. A thousand years? A hundred thousand? A million? There had been small balancing formation here that was the little buddy of Balancing Rock, but one winter it just fell. Next I headed out the The Windows, the pair of holes through the rock wall that I had photographed from a distance. Turns out there are more than the two. I saw a third nearby, and there was a triple arch in that formation. Not only are there a lot of arches down this way, but also a lot of places where the erosion was eating a hole in the cliff, the homes of future arches. I think I saw the most down in that region. It’s said there are over two thousands arches in the park. If so, they need to take more of them out of storage. I think I saw about twenty at most.

Small hole. Arches NP.

I went down to the end of the main road, spotting a couple of more arches and windows. While this park was one of the more accessible ones I had visited, a lot of the arches still required hiking to see. I saw what I could, and by that time the sun was starting to get low in the sky. I headed back, and then the bicycles came. I understand that people like to bike, but a pair of the things, on a stretch with a forty mile an hour speed limit, holding up a dozen cars, was a little much. We finally all got our break though, and I was able to get around them. From there it was back to the motel, just as the sun was setting. Tomorrow was the last big day of exploration. I would be driving across Utah and back to Vegas, and there was a lot of stuff to amaze me along the way.

The first target for this day was Capitol Reef National Park. I found out that a reef was a line of mountains without a pass, something that would stop the movement of settlers. The name Capitol was added because of rock formations that reminded people of the domes of capitols. This was a day of contrasts. Very few radio signals out here in the wilds, and mostly talk radio at that. Almost no gas stations and bathrooms, and when I found those, there weren’t any restaurants. Capitol Reef didn’t have a small town at the entrance like Zion and Bryce, only the visitor center, which had no food or drinks. Luckily I had eaten a candy bar and procured a large coke at the gas station a couple of miles down the road before I got there.

On the scenic drive.

Reef had a scenic drive that required an entrance fee like all National Parks, and a highway that went right through it. The method of payment was putting money in an envelope and putting it through a slot. Since I had an Annual Pass I just ignored it. I took the scenic route, which led to some spectacular formations. The view of the landscape outside the park was also pretty damned cool. There were some washes to cross with warning signs, so I kept a close watch on the weather. Then it was back to the visitor center and onto the highway that cut through the park. The formations were pretty damned spectacular along that route as well. It was about a hundred and fifty miles to the next park, Arches, with almost nothing along the way. The terrain was really varied, with some streams, desert, stands of pines, and even some marshlands. Cattle grazed on green grass, while across the road desert scrub was the only vegetation. Found one gas station on the way from Reef to I-70.

Formation on the way to I-80.

One of the ‘Windows’ at Arches.

From I-70 it was down highway 191 to Arches National Park. Arches was undergoing road construction, which happened at night, so they closed at 7 PM each day. And some of the most spectacular formations were off limits until the roads were finished. I arrived about 4 and was soon on another switch back climbing high into the sky. Again, spectacular rock formations, including some balancing rocks to go along with the windows and arches. I didn’t get all the way through the park. I needed to get something to eat, so I only spent a little over two hours in the park.

Balancing Rock at Arches.

Moab was not a large town, but it was a real town, with about a dozen motels, McDonalds, Wendys, Pizza Hut and Denny’s. Checked into my hotel, and was very glad I had booked, since otherwise they had no vacancies and went out to eat, then back to the hotel to sleep. Woke about five and had trouble getting back to sleep. Finally dozed off, and was back up again at six. This was the first night of the trip I had any trouble sleeping. Couldn’t really blame it on the room, which was comfortable.

Day 6: Friday

Colorado River at Dead Horse Point.

Got up and ate breakfast at the motel, then got on the road. I had a long day planned, with four stops. First up was Dead Horse Point State Park, just north of Moab. I had planned to go to the Needles section of Canyonlands National Park after this (not to be confused with Needles, California), but found that the Island in the Sky section was just down the road from the state park, so that was to be my second destination of the day. Dead Horse Point was named after a herd of reject horses that were left to die of thirst within two hundred feet of the Colorado River after the acceptable mounts had been taken. The view from the well stocked visitors center was spectacular, that of the point overlook even more so. As advertised, it was a miniature Grand Canyon, which was as it should be since this actually was part of that massive canyon system. The rock formations on the way to the park were also spectacular. Met and talked with a German couple, then an older couple from Pennsylvania. The German couple talked about how much wilderness there was out here. I guess I agreed, but seeing as we got to this point by paved road, it didn’t seem to be wilderness to me. Unpopulated, yes, mostly natural, but wilderness? Bought a Bluray disc of the geology of Southern Utah and Northern Arizona, something I was sure would come in handy in planning my post-apocalyptic series. I already had a good idea of the path my characters were going to take to find the refuge of Zion, and this would help make those decisions.

Grand Canyon in Canyonlands National Park.

Next was a couple of miles down the road to Canyonlands National Park. Canyonlands is where the Colorado and Green Rivers come together. There were some spectacular views on the way, but the Grand View was well named. Here you could see the entire canyon laid out, spread wide. It had to be at least ten miles, possibly the eighteen they state as the maximum width. Beautiful formations in every direction. Satisfied that I had seen what I needed to see I headed out. Canyonlands was my sixth National Park of the trip and wouldn’t be the last. This was the first park I didn’t go into the visitor’s center at. I had bought something at all the others, and was starting to get weighed down with books.

More of the canyon at Canyonlands.

Next stop, Monument Valley on the Utah-Arizona border. I had read a lot about it, and was anxious to get there. Another long drive through mostly empty country. Mostly high desert, some sparse forest, a few rivers. An hour portion with no radio stations, AM or FM, then a station in Navajo, with a combination of Native American and Reggae music. Bizarre. Commercials were in Navajo, with English words and numbers here and there to fill in for concepts not expressed in their language. Going through the valley I was surprised that there were so few turn offs for people to take pictures. A real oversight. And the valley was not as spectacular as I had hoped. Oh, the formations were cool, but I think having explored the National Parks getting there I had been overloaded by beautiful rocks. The formations were more spread out than those of the National Parks, which was different. I drove off, and the two best formations were at the end, with, again, no overlooks.

Monument in Monument Valley.

So next I headed toward Tuba City down in Arizona, where I hoped to drive into the Navajo Reservation and get a good look at the Painted Desert. It was almost two hours to Tuba City, another indication of how vast and empty this land was. I turned off from Tuba and took the back road to Winslow, which gave me the same arrival time as the front way. So off I drove, my GPS telling me I would be in Winslow in an hour, looking for the Painted Desert. I saw parts of it, but again there were no places to turn off to take pictures. A rainbow arched over the high desert from the recent rain. And when I got to the next highway, the one I thought would take me to Winslow, and my GPS said I was seven minutes away, I saw a sign that said I-40 was over fifty miles away. I checked my cell phone and saw that the time had gone back one hour. Utah uses daylight savings time, and so do the Arizona Indian Reservations, but not the rest of the state. So it was fifty miles of almost deserted road on the way to I-40, with no bathrooms. Hell, with no anything at all. I checked into the Motel Six, and then found that the Painted Desert was actually best viewed from Petrified Forest National Park, my destination the next day.